In those years I imitated him, to the point of transcription, to the point of devoted and impassioned plagiarism. I felt: Macedonio is metaphysics, is literature. Whoever preceded him might shine in history, but they were all rough drafts of Macedonio, imperfect previous versions. To not imitate this canon would have represented incredible negligence.
From Jorge Luis Borges' eulogy for Macedonio Fernández. Borges' relationship with Macedonio was complicated, as recounted in
The Man Who Invented Borges, a fine essay by Marcelo Ballvé. Macedonio's most famous work, the posthumous-by-design work (he believed literature should be aged like good whiskey) The Museum of Eterna's Novel has finally been translated and published in English translation,
here is an excerpt from the novel (one of the ninety or so prologues). The introduction to the novel, written by its translator Margaret Schwartz, has been put online by the publisher (parts
1,
2,
3,
4,
5). Schwartz also sat down for a
short interview. You can download an mp3 of a
great hour-long panel discussion on Macedonio and a
master's thesis on Macedonio by Peter Loggie [pdf]
posted by Kattullus
on Jul 21, 2010 -
7 comments
Should you find yourself wandering around the city of Leiden, the Netherlands sometime, you may
notice some curious markings on the city's walls.
These
Muurgedichten ("Wall Poems") adorn many of the town's streets
(clickable map), and many English-language poets are represented:
one John Keats, for instance, inside a bookshop;
Dylan Thomas,
E. E. Cummings,
W.B. Yeats, some guy
called William Shakespeare, or this
ode to Charlie Parker by American
William Waring Cuney.
[more inside]
posted by goodnewsfortheinsane
on Apr 5, 2009 -
15 comments
Jorge Luis Borges "excerpts from two of the six Norton Lectures that Jorge Luis Borges delivered at Harvard University in the fall of 1967 and spring of 1968. The recordings of these six lectures, only lately discovered in the Harvard University Archives, uniquely capture the cadences, candor, wit, and remarkable erudition of one of the most extraordinary and enduring literary voices of our age. Through a twist of fate that the author of Labyrinths himself would have relished, these lost lectures return to us now--in Borges's own voice."
In English - mp3
posted by vronsky
on Jan 10, 2007 -
46 comments
Faith based prisons... Can Gov. Jeb Bush's new drive to introduce God to the inmates make a difference, or was Jesus 'dying for our sins' not enough already? Is Jesus a solution or an excuse?
"Night has fallen. He has died now.
A fly crawls over the still flesh.
Of what use is it to me that this man suffered,
If I am suffering now?" -
Jorge Luis Borges
posted by 0bvious
on Nov 25, 2005 -
36 comments
